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Finding the Best Book Ever!

The ultimate holiday weekend of the summer–the 4th of July– is now past and unless you have a vacation planned it’s almost two months before another. Time for some summer reading! Time to look for your best book ever!

How to find the best book ever?

Some of us like getting recommendations from friends, relatives, neighbors. My best recommender ever was a teacher/librarian, Mrs. Twesme, from high school days. Just the other day, a teacher friend of mine from Wisconsin teaching days touted a recent read on Facebook. The suggestions just keep coming!

With library training in my background, I’m still inclined to follow a perhaps old-fashioned route – looking at the subject headings of a book I liked and then searching for other titles with the same or similar subject headings.

Washington County Library’s NoveList Plus database is an excellent resource. If you like a book you’ve read by a certain author, use NoveList Plus to get an annotated listed of all of the titles by that author. Or if you like a particular author but have mined all that he or she has to offer, search NoveList Plus’ “Author Read-alikes.” NoveList Plus now has audiobook recommendations, as well.

New at Washington County Library is an online readers’ advisory service – “Your Next Read.” Answer a few questions to indicate what you’re looking for and our crack readers’ advisory staff will email you in a few days with 3 to 5 suggested titles they think you will enjoy. Specify book, audiobook, or e-book format.

Put a favorite title or author into an “if you like/liked” search string on the Internet and you’re sure to come up with some suggestions, as well.

Go ahead, scout out your next good read. The search is part of the fun.

Library Woman is Joey Halbach, Community Relations Librarian for Washington County Library. Contact her at: joey.halbach@co.washington.mn.us.